Communicating information about cities to both leaders and citizens has become increasingly important as transparency is seen as a key to efficiency and the ability to garner trust. As a 2017 report from the Volcker Alliance put it, “Legislators, advocacy groups, executive branch officials, and citizens are at a huge disadvantage if it is extremely difficult or even impossible for them to dig out the data they need.”

One of the most useful ways for cities to provide just this kind of information is through dashboards, which can be graphically appealing ways to give users information they need in a quick, concise fashion. Multiple cultures have a saying similar to “a picture is worth a thousand words.” The parallel here is “a dashboard is worth a thousand data points.”

• Publication date: August 2023
• Authors: Katherine Barrett and Richard Greene